The Amana Colonies

This particular stop along the way was one that I had been looking forward to for some time. After reading about the True Inspirationists and their communal living I was interested in seeing how they had made it work for so long. I will start you off with the evening we arrived as it could be the funniest part of the trip. I had been racing the sun the whole way there and although I was determined to arrive before sun down, I sadly did not. And once it went down it headed there fast. By the time that I got to the gate of the RV park and campground it was so dark it was hard to see too far infront of me. The campsite map was taped to the front of the office door with my campsite circled. I followed the map into the campgrounds and headed toward our site. Now I feel that it is important to paint the entire picture for you. We have been driving in Amana for a bit and the closest home was several miles back. As we are driving into this site in the dark there are very few trailers or RVs around. Most of them are pretty close together near the front. As we are driving in further and further there is almost no one around. We then past two metal buildings and head back to a completely secluded area which happens to be near the road. It was a bit creepy to say the least.

However, we set up the tent and got the sleeping bags in there. I get out my phone to call my husband to let him know where I was. After all if we disappear in the night the police would need to have some place to start looking. I am pulling out the cooler and duffel bags. I can't find my phone. I start searching with a flash light and now have emptied almost all of the contents of the truck onto the grass. NO PHONE! I remembered seeing some pay phones back by the metal buildings. So we leave everything and head back to the buildings. I put in $1.50 because it was long distance and no sound is heard. The last place to look is the office as I know that I had it then. So we load back into the truck and headed back to the office. Pulling up I see the glimmer of metal against the gravel and breath the biggest sigh of relief.

Then I called Joe and let him know where the police should start their investigations in the morning.

Next morning we headed into Main Amana to start our journey. We watched a short video on the history of the Amana colonies. Here is a link to the history if anyone is interested.

http://www.amanacolonies.com/history.htm

It is hard to truly express the Amana colonies into writing. Many parts of the colonies are like stepping back into time a hundred years or more. The general store had the general ledger showing how they ran accounts. The colonist got credit at the store to use each year. They also got weekly food supplies. Although, most of their meals were eaten communally. While visiting the communal kitchen we learned that this was mostly for the adults. The children would be fed at home as the meals were not social occasions. The adults were given 15 minutes to eat and then go to work.

The other thing that I found was remarkable was that their children were in school year round, six days a week. Before school age the children would go to kinderschool. Which was basically a daycare. The daily schedule for a mother would be to feed her children and then drop them off, head to eat, and then work until about noon. From noon to two she would take her children home and feed them. They would rest until it was time to go back to work for the rest of the day.

The Amana colonies were filled with faith, devotion, and a lot of hard work. We still have ruminates of their beginnings in our homes today in the form of Amana appliances, some furniture, and some toys. Their culture is amazing story and well worth visit.

Once we had visited the Tractor Museum we headed west to Mt. Rushmore. Which mainly consisted of a lot of driving and road weary travelers.

Chicago!

Chicago is an amazing city when the sun is shining and you are on a tall ship with a pirate that looked like he just got off a Malibu Rum billboard. On the other hand, when it is pouring and you CTA bus driver kicks you off the bus to walk a couple of miles due to rerouting during a run it is a cold place. We spend two days in Chicago and the first is why I will leave a piece of my heart in Chicago. On this day we rode the train from Elgin to Chicago's Union Station. From there we took a bus to the Grayline Double Decker Bus. We rode the bus around and heard interesting facts about the city until about half way through the tour when our stomachs protested. We then caught a bus to Rock N' Roll McDonalds. Now here is my though on this. It was a very cool McDonalds, but the food is not different so not worth double the money which is what I ended up paying. Just about everything on the menu was $1 to $.50 more. If I had it to do again I would have just gone here for an ice cream cone.

We then took another bus to Navy Pier for some family fun by Lake Michigan. We picked up tickets to ride the Lighthouse ride, Wave Swings, Carousel, and Ferris Wheel. Then we went and got tickets to ride Windy the Tall Ship. Their 5 pm show was "Real Pirates Stories." So we got aboard and got seats on the midship and learned about the Pirates that had once sailed on the very lake that we were on. The stories were fascinating and the crew was amazing. My favorite story was about Pirate Fox who imprisoned a entire town and got them to do his bidding for over a year. He was sentenced to death only after he shot a goose a few year later.

After our cruise we headed to dinner at an Italian restaurant where we had our first taste of deep dish. Then headed back to the train to ride back to the hotel. However, we missed our train so we had to wait for the next one. This one was at 10:40 and when we headed to get on their were four police officers barring the way and only allowed boarding twenty minutes before departure. They also did bag checks as we boarded.

Once home we collapsed in bed and got ready for the next day. However, my alarm didn't go off so I awoke forty minutes before we needed to be at the train station and we had not even packed our stuff up yet. So we did a rush job and grabbed McDs breakfast to make it just in time. We got off at Union Station and headed to Chicago. Once we got to Union Station we headed to our bus that would take us to the Museum Campus. As we walked out of Union Station we saw buckets of rain pouring down. We rushed to our bus stop because it was supposed to be there in a few minutes. However, no bus came. Then Blake said he had to use the bathroom. I went into the nearest building to see if they had a public restroom. When I went to the desk the security guard told me that they did not have a public restroom. Also, the door that I had used to access the building was supposed to be locked so another guard was locking it and I would have to exit the side door and walk around the building. Hmphf!

Back at the bus stop the next bus came and we sat happily headed to the planetarium. About three stops away from the planetarium the bus driver asked everyone to get off the bus. He didn't give a reason and only after asking were we given the reason that they were rerouted for the day due to the Taste of Chicago Run/Walk. So I followed a Field Museum volunteer to the Campus and headed back to the planetarium. In the pouring rain. With a seven year old who was wearing flip flops! Once there we headed around the museum in rapid fire style reading only a few plaques in each room. Then we watched a movie about IBEX, a NASA project, and headed to the Shedd Aquarium.

The Shedd was packed and the line to get in was over an hour line. The will call line that we had to stand in to get our tickets was still twenty minutes long. There we knew that we were running out of time fast so we headed directly to the penguins. We did stop briefly to look at the turtles, dolphins, and sea otters. The kids loved and we could have easily spend multiple days in here alone.

At this point we were starving and headed to the Taste of Chicago. We got two pieces of deep dish pizza and everyone was full. I was nervous that the kids would still be starving but they were not even able to finish both pieces. We got a dream cup, orange sherbert and vanilla ice cream to top it off. We all thought that this was great.

This was the end of our day in Chicago so we road the train back and went to the store to get some food for the trip. Unfortunately we pushed our luck and ended up putting our tent up in the dark. Then found that I had lost my phone. We finally after an hour of searching ended up finding it at the front office on the ground. The only thing that I can assume is that I knocked it out when I got the tent site information. Then fell asleep to the sound of rustling wind in an open field; For there were no other campers with us that night.

Homeward Bound!

So we left Avoca and headed to Niagara Falls. I went to the US side and realized that this was not the Falls that I remember, because apparently that is on the Canada side. So if you are headed to the Falls remember to keep driving until you are in Canada. The kids were not impressed with the Falls which confuses me because they are pretty impressive. Now we decided to only take the Maid of the Mist tour due to time, but the kids said that they would really want to do the Cave of the Winds another time. On the Canadian side there is an observation restaurant and a great wax museum. After seeing the Falls we headed to bed early because we had a lot of driving to do the next day.

The next morning we headed out for Cleveland, OH around six and got there about 9:30. We parked and headed into the Rock N' Roll Hall of Fame. The Hall of Fame is amazing but a bit dry for the kids. Also, I realized that they knew very few of the people in it. They did learn about Elvis, Les Paul, Bruce Springsteen, and more. We got a souvenir for the boys and one for their guitar teacher before moving on to the second hall of fame. The Second Hall of Fame that we saw that day was just south in Canton and was the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

The boys had a ton of fun there and talked me into letting them get a package of trading cards. Now they want to collect them, so at some point in the future we will head to Target to get a binder. That will be after they remind me, of course.

Now all of this was good and if it had gone my way we would end on this note. However, it did not. From Canton, we headed west through the rest of Ohio. For those of you that have a GPS you might understand. My GPS, aka Lola, took me on surface streets for about 20 miles. She ate up about an hour before getting us to a freeway. We headed onto the toll road and right before Indiana we payed Ohio $10 for the pleasure of using their freeway for half the state. Once in Indiana we got the pleasure of heading onto another toll road and proceeded to drive through Indiana.

At the end of the thruway we pulled up to the booths and there seemed to me a lot of congestion. I blew this off as the time of the day as it was not almost six. However, when I got my turn at the transponder I realized it was because the transponder was not working well and took four times to read my ticket. Indiana was only $6.75. I attempted to pay with my credit card and when that didn't work because of the same reader issue I paid in cash. As I drove away I couldn't find my credit card. I am assuming that I left it in the machine in my hast to get away from the noxious fumes, the impatient honking, and the rumbling engines of semis.

My wonderful husband called and canceled our cards. I can't thank him enough for helping me out of a very stressful situation.

Just Visiting

So it has been awhile since I last posted and I thought that I should let you guys know what I have been up to. I have been having a wonderful time with my family and friends over on the east coast. I hope that you don't mind that I haven't been blogging so that I could spend as much time with everyone as possible. I will be hitting the road on the 24th again and I will resume blogging the trip then.

Down on the Boardwalk

We started the next day taking a stroll on the boardwalk. Like they say, “It ain’t what it used to be.” Atlantic City is more about casinos and a little bit more like Vegas than it was awhile ago. Obviously a long while ago. But, we did walk along and end up at Rainforest Cafe for lunch. This was a huge treat as my kids had not been here before even though we have one near our home. The kids loved the environment and had a blast with the thunderstorm.
After lunch we headed to visit with family. We had the a delightful time with my family. I can’t thank them enough for a wonderful visit that days later my children were still raving about.

From Hannibal To Atlantic City - Our Journey

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At George Washington’s Feet

The next morning we had pancakes and headed into Colonial Williamsburg. We started our tour by listening to George Washington explaining what our options are with the Revolution and why we should fight. It was very interesting listening to his speech and he then answered questions from the attendants. From there we headed to take a children’s tour. The kids really enjoyed this. The tour guide was great and centered everything towards the kids. He was very energetic and interactive. He taught the children to courtesy in the fashion of the day. He explained that if you were a farmer or a merchant you would want your daughter to marry into a higher class and into gentry class if possible. He explained that the way to do that was to make sure that she had the training to fit into the life. Also women would look for men with strong calfs as this meant that they spent time dancing and riding horses, therefore in the gentry class. He taught the children a rhythm dance that the slaves used to help them survive the many hours of hard labor.
From there we headed to get iced coffee and water as it was 99 degrees out. I couldn’t help but laugh at the number of people who stopped me to ask where I had gotten my Starbucks. We enjoyed our Starbucks as we rode around Colonial Williamsburg in our carriage. Ryleigh said that she loved it as she was a princess and should get a carriage. It was a great experience and we loved the horses. The poor things were so hot though and after our ride they only had one more ride before they were going to return to the stables to rest in the shade.
After riding around Williamsburg we walked around and went into several of the shops. We visited a wig makers shop, a silversmiths, a blacksmiths, and a baker. We also visited an apothecary shop and learned about the trade. I personally found this fascinating and had a lot of questions to ask. We found out that a male that could read Latin was able to become an apprentice and the apprenticeship was about seven years. We looked at casts and medicines. We learned that a family that could not afford to pay for a cast or a medicine could open a credit and pay over time. We also got to see a real skeleton as in it was real bones.
After we made it back to the visitor’s center I called to find out if our cruise on Assateague was still going to be happening since they were calling for thunderstorms. They said that they would so I drove the 3 hours and waited at the dock. The sky was looking ominous but no rain had fallen yet. However, the radar showed that the storm that was rolling in was thick and we would not be able to wait it out. Disappointed again I looked for a place to stay the night. I looked on my GPS and it was only 118 miles to Atlantic City so I thought that I would try and made a reservation at Trump Marina. The only catch was that it was a 118 miles as the crow flies and when the GPS showed the route it was 3 hours of driving. So I began to drive.
Halfway through I found out that the GPS route wanted me to take a ferry that closed at 6 pm. So I ended up driving another 2 1/2 hours to go around it. When I finally got into Atlantic City at 12:40 I was fried. I grumpily checked into the hotel and fell into my comfy bed. I did like the Trump Marina and the beds were great. Not to say this it wasn’t without its faults. But I am a sucker for a good bed and good pillows. I would like to stay again at the Trump Taj Mahal on the boardwalk.